Black PR to fire on eve of voting day, media expert says

19 сентября 2012, 14:06

Ales Antsipenka, expert in media for the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), told this reporters on Tuesday in Minsk. The BAJ made yesterday a presentation of the survey that focuses on monitoring 17 pro-governmental and independent media between September 2 and September 15.

According to Ales Anstipenka, the pro-governmental media have not provided people with a proper information despite the fact that the indicated period was the most active one for the election campaign. The pro-governmental media had a goal to decrease the heat of the political struggle, to censor opposition candidates' addresses and to depoliticize voters. All these resulted in a decrease of the people's interest in the election campaign.

"The devaluation of the information in the people self-consciousness has happened," Mr. Antsipenka said.

However, the pro-governmental media coverage of the current election campaign is more neutral than that of election campaigns of recent years. But the authorities used to implement technologies of 'black pr' at the very beginning of the campaign.

According to Mr. Antsipenka, there was a political advertisement in videos, which had been shown to people watching TV debates before candidates' speeches. The videos promoted local authorities, that is, pro-governmental candidates were portrayed in a more favorable light than opposition candidates. However, there were less political advertisement than during election campaigns of recent years.

Mr. Ansipenka, head of the monitoring group of the BAJ, said that 'black pr' was kept "for a rainy day."

"Black PR will fire on the eve of the voting day. Watch Belarus' TV on September 22," he said.